


Moratorium

by marcaskane (noblydonedonnanoble)



Category: Fleabag (TV)
Genre: F/M, did I really write a COVID fic?, yes i did
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:01:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27373867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noblydonedonnanoble/pseuds/marcaskane
Summary: I’m not a selfish person. Or at least, I’m not as selfish as my family still sometimes seems to think I am.But if I, perhaps, got plastered last night and texted--That would be one of the most selfish things I’ve ever done. If I did it.
Relationships: Fleabag/Priest (Fleabag)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 35





	Moratorium

**Author's Note:**

> I know there have been plenty of COVID fics going around a million different fandoms, and I haven't really been interested in contributing to that, but this idea came to me and wouldn't leave me alone, so here we are. I hope folks enjoy.

_March_

I knew I shouldn’t have broken things off with the Fiancé.

No, of course I don’t mean that. He snored too loud and chewed with his mouth wide open, and if I was ending it over rubbish like that, then clearly a pandemic would have been too much to bear.

But it’s been a week and a half since I closed up the café; two weeks since I last saw Dad and Stepmother; and Christ, Claire hasn’t been back from Finland since Christmas. She’d been meant to come for Easter, but now…

Now it’s just me in my flat all alone, and maybe the Fiancé and I didn’t want to get married anymore, but the least we could have done was keep awkward company through an international crisis.

Unless he’s keeping awkward company with someone else already.

_(I turn to social media to take a peek._

_Ah, there she is. He sure is advertising it front and center for a relationship that can’t have started more than three months ago._

_She’s got bigger tits than I have. Good for him.)_

Well, he still could have been keeping awkward company with me instead.

Without a Fiancé around, I’ve reorganized my meager book collection twenty-five times in the last week. I’ve spent hours looking for new recipes online, only to revert to the same three meals I cooked back when I was in university. I’ve slept. A lot.

I miss people. I miss Claire, and Klare—or at least, I miss how much Klare is head over for heels for Claire, who _deserves_ it. I miss Dad and I even miss Stepmother, a bit—or at least, I miss goading Stepmother in person so that I can see her expression, rather than just getting an earful on my voicemail every morning.

_(Not that I listen to them. But it’s only a matter of time until deleting them unheard no longer gives me any joy.)_

I miss Boo, who I know would have made the most of this time. She’d be finding a larger location for the café, or haggling us down to a better deal from our tea and coffee distributor (which I told myself I’d do _months_ ago).

And I miss--

He must be busy. Claire says loads of people have been turning to ‘spiritual advisors’ of all sorts to work through their pandemic depression and anxiety and the like.

_(Not that I asked. Out loud.)_

I hope he’s not quarantining alone.

Oh, God, unless he’s quarantining with Pam.

I hope he’s not quarantining alone, unless the only alternative is quarantining with Pam.

Does that sound too much like a prayer for someone who doesn’t believe in God? Unless it’s too mean-spirited to sound like a prayer.

Fuck, I miss him.

_April_

I’m not a selfish person. Or at least, I’m not as selfish as my family still sometimes seems to think I am.

_(As though not wanting to FaceTime my dad for the fifth time this week is selfish.)_

But if I, _perhaps_ , got plastered last night and texted--

That would be one of the most selfish things I’ve ever done. If I did it.

\--

**Today** 1:17 AM   
**Fleabag:** I miss you.   
  
**Fleabag:** Fuck, I didn't mean t   
  
**Fleabag:** Not that I don't. I mean. But distance means texting too and I was gonna keep all the distance. Oodles of distance. I’ve been doing bad and was wondering if you’ve been doing bad and hoping not but that doesn’t mean a text’s fair game.   
  
**Fleabag:** I’m sorry. Fuck.

\--

Maybe he’s got a new number.

Maybe he’s blocked mine.

_(I don’t know if that makes me feel any better.)_

This is what happens when you find out that Boris Johnson managed to not die in intensive care. You get plastered and basically admit to a man that you’re still hung up on him a year after he broke up with you for God.

\--

**Today** 6:54 PM   
**Priest:** That’s alright. I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve nearly texted you since this all started. Just didn’t seem fair.   
  
**Priest:** I’d like to say something profound and reassuring about God but since you don’t believe in Him. . . I haven’t exactly been great either. My parents were visiting when lockdown started and they only just left the other day.

\--

We never texted much, for the brief time that we knew each other. Certainly not enough for me to be able to read into what he says when he texts back while I’m halfway through eating dinner.

I really, really shouldn’t read into it.

Only--

There’s the fact that he replied at all. The fact that he didn’t say he missed me, but it’s still all over his answer. And the thing that _really_ gets me: the fact that his response was open, his mention of his parents begging for a reply. He wants me to answer, if I want to answer.

In the same way that I wanted him to answer, a little bit. If he wanted to answer.

I really, really shouldn’t answer.

_May_

“Oh, you’re not still carrying on with your Priest, are you?”

I immediately take on a more neutral expression, trying to tune out the text preview notification hovering above Claire’s head. “He’s not my Priest.”

Claire hums, noncommittal as ever about this whole situation. “You know it’s only lasted this long because neither of you have to address your feelings with a literal pandemic keeping you in your separate houses.”

“Yes, thank you, Claire,” I say through gritted teeth. How does she manage to make it sound like she’s also somehow gloating about Finland’s superior COVID response?

_(Because she did it aloud often enough to make it clear that all of her references to our quarantine are meant to be veiled gloating about Finland’s superior COVID response.)_

“‘Oh, we only chatted to catch up on how lockdown’s been treating us,’ you said. But you’re furloughed and he’s not exactly going to regale you with tales of his parishioners’ depression and anxiety. So if it were just a little catch up, you’d have run out of things to say two weeks ago.”

I know she’s right, and Claire knows I know, which is an unpleasant position to be in, but it at least means that I don’t have to bother with admitting it.

“I knew I shouldn’t have told you I’d begun chatting with him again,” I tell her instead. Honestly, I might have kept it from her, only I left her a voicemail in panic the morning after my first text, once I realized what I’d done. By the time I’d heard back from her, another day had passed, and in our new and improved, honesty-driven relationship, I couldn’t bring myself to lie.

_(“You just wanted to tell someone that he’s still stuck on you, too,” she’d told me then. She wasn’t wrong.)_

She knows that I remember that comment, too, which means that she doesn’t have to bother with repeating it.

“Just promise me you’ll put an end to it if it starts to hurt too much.”

I swallow and nod, as though it doesn’t already hurt like mad. As though I can imagine a world in which I could bring myself to stop talking to the only man I’ve ever really fallen in love with.

\--

The trouble is that it’s all so _friendly_. It’s light-hearted jokes and reactions to whatever film or book or series we’ve just watched. It’s the Priest talking about church while I make a slightly inappropriate number of jokes about being an atheist. It’s _disgustingly_ platonic.

Except that it’s not. I don’t know how, when we’ve skirted around any mention of the first part of our relationship beyond my very first reference to our plan to stay out of each other’s way. We’ve skirted around anything too vulnerable, too deep. No more confessionals, no more drunken chats where we’re just a touch too honest.

_(Or just honest enough. I miss how honest we were. I miss how he made me want to be honest.)_

It wasn’t platonic when we sat outside of his house and he offered to be friends, and it’s not platonic now.

_June_

**Today** 3:00 PM   
**Priest:** I just saw your stepmother while picking up a parishioner’s shopping.   
  
**Fleabag:** Please tell me she didn’t see you.   
  
**Priest:** I truly wish I could.   
  
**Fleabag:** Oh no.   
  
**Priest:** She tried to invite me to dinner. I had to remind her about COVID.   
  
**Priest:** Her mask wasn’t covering her nose.   
  
**Fleabag:** Did you tell her to fix it?   
  
**Priest:** So she could murder me in a Tesco? My mum and dad couldn’t bear the shame.   
  
**Fleabag:** At least she shops at the posh Tesco.   
  
**Priest:** That is a reassurance, thank you.   
  
**Fleabag:** So when did she pencil you in for dinner?   
  
**Priest:** I’m to call her the moment we’re out of quarantine.   
  
**Fleabag:** Around the new year, then.

\--

Shit, he’s _calling_ me.

We haven’t rung each other up a single time since all this started. Not on purpose. Or, I suppose, we never _agreed_ not to speak on the phone. But I very much made the decision to avoid calling him, for fear of being wrenched into reality at the first sound of his voice.

I nearly send him to voicemail, but, considering that I just texted him two minutes ago, that might be a little transparent.

“Y’ello,” I say breezily. God, I sound exquisitely nonchalant. My heart is racing, but I sure as fuck sound breezy.

“Do you really think we’ll be in quarantine for the rest of the year?”

_(God, his voice is heavenly. No pun intended.)_

He sounds worried—for me or for Britain, I’m not quite sure.

_(That’s why he called? Was he that eager for an excuse?)_

“Do you not?” I’m genuinely baffled.

“I… I’m not sure. I hadn’t really thought that far ahead.” The Priest hesitates. “I’d like to think that people have started to give a damn about each other, and if that’s true, I fucking _hope_ we’re not here until next year.”

_(Somehow, I’d forgotten how much I love hearing him swear.)_

“But…” I offer.

“Plenty of people don’t give a damn about other people.”

“And think of my stepmother.”

“And plenty of people don’t wear masks properly, if they wear them at all.”

I swallow and look down at the hem of my shirt, smoothing my fingers over a loose thread. “It must be nice, still having hope that people will pull together.”

The Priest answers, his voice warm and gentle. “It must be nice, believing with absolute certainty that it won’t be enough.”

For a second, we both let his words just… sit there.

“Oh, and hi, by the way.”

My heart pounds in my throat. Vaguely, I ask myself whether this is the moment when it hurts too much. I ask myself whether I should hang up.

“Hi.”

“Hi.”

And then I feel myself smiling. “We’ve already covered that bit.”

_July_

I’ve drunk over half a bottle of wine one evening when the Priest rings me up out of the blue. I haven’t heard from him all day, which is normal—it’s Tuesday, which is his day to run errands for a few home-bound parishioners and pay a visit to the ones in the hospital.

_(Should I know his schedule so closely? Probably not. Definitely not.)_

But calling me without a warning, when we haven’t exchanged a word all day? That’s the furthest thing from normal.

I barely get out a, “Hello,” before he tells me, “We just lost our first member of the church to COVID.”

“Fuck,” I breathe. “You hadn’t let on… I mean, I didn’t know that anyone was that sick.”

“That’s just it,” he says. He sounds breathless. “She _wasn’t_ that sick, until she was. They were expecting to discharge her in the next few days, but then she got _so much worse_.” He stops speaking, but it very much feels like he’s going to carry on, so I wait, and sure enough—“She wasn’t even 50. She had no pre-existing conditions. She should have been _fine_.”

Shit, he sounds angry. Of course, he has every reason to, but he hasn’t let himself get like this with me, not even over text.

“I’m so sorry, Father,” I whisper.

He inhales a shaky breath, then exhales slowly. “Fucking _hell_.” Over the phone, I hear a thump—whether he’s hit his head or his fist or his foot against something, I couldn’t say. “No, I’m… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have sprung this on you, not without warning. I got home and I didn’t even think, I just… I wanted to talk to you.”

“That’s fine.”

_(It’s probably not fine.)_

“It’s probably not fine.”

I don’t know how to answer. Is this the moment when we’re meant to acknowledge how unhealthy and counterproductive it is to use a pandemic as an excuse to remain in each other’s lives? If we do, does that mean we’ve got to stop?

“I don’t mind,” I offer instead.

The Priest takes this in. “Would you tell me about your day?”

He’s in denial along with me. I’m a terrible influence.

_August_

I tell myself that some good is coming from it. I was _lonely_ , that first month of lockdown, and there was only so long that I could lean on Claire before she tired of me. And as much as I love Dad, his brevity doesn’t exactly translate well to phone and FaceTime, especially when the pandemic has taken most of the excitement from his routine.

So when I accidentally-on-purpose invited the Priest back into my life, each day got just a smidge easier. A smidge happier.

And he’s admitted to the same, if for different reasons. Mostly in jokes: he describes the amount of doubt and uncertainty people bring to him each day, and says, with a smile in his voice, that daily communion with an atheist gives him some perspective.

_(I miss that smile. But without even discussing it, we seem to have agreed that a video chat would be a misstep too far.)_

I have more of a routine because of him. I’m pretty sure I’ve been drinking less during this pandemic than I would be otherwise… because of him.

That’s the problem. There’s just enough good that I can tell myself it’s not bad.

_September_

**Today** 10:23 AM

**Fleabag:** It’s official. Claire’s coming to stay with me.   
  
**Priest:** I’m so glad! How soon?   
  
**Fleabag:** She hasn’t got the tickets sorted out yet, but soon. Probably before the weekend.   
  
**Priest:** You’re going to be an auntie.   
  
**Priest:** I mean, you already are an auntie, but it’ll be more tangible.   
  
**Fleabag:** It’s already tangible. I’m building the cot.   
  
**Priest:** What, right now?   
  
**Fleabag:** Right now.   
  
**Priest:** Would you send me a photo once you’ve finished?   
  
**Fleabag:** If you’re worried about the integrity of the cot…   
  
**Priest:** I’m worried about the integrity of the cot.   
  
**Priest:** What if it crumbles under the baby’s weight?   
  
**Fleabag:** I’ll test it with a football.   
  
**Priest:** You’ve got me.   
  
**Fleabag:** How?   
  
**Priest:** I can’t decide which is more absurd, the idea that a football is analogous to an infant, or the idea of you having a football on hand in the first place.   
  
**Fleabag:** Analogous?????   
  
**Fleabag:** Who texts with words like analogous?   
  
**Priest:** Sorry, I’ll throw some fucks and damns around to remind you why you like me.   
  
**Priest:** Chatting with me.   
  
**Priest:** Why you like chatting with me.   
  
**Today** 12:09 PM   
**Priest:** Fuck.   
  
**Today** 2:40 PM   
**Fleabag:** Sorry, I went out to buy a football.   
  
**Priest:** Jesus Christ.

\--

I did actually go out to buy a football. Partially to lean into the joke, and partially to find time to sort out whether I could even text him back. Whether I should.

_October_

Yes, I talk to the Priest at least as much as Claire talks to Klare, if not more. And no, I do not want to talk about it.

\--

**Today** 7:55 PM   
**Priest:** What are you drinking tonight?   
  
**Fleabag:** I’m not. I’m on baby duty while Claire does a self-care night.   
  
**Priest:** Shame. I don’t like drinking alone.   
  
**Priest:** I’m not advocating for drinking with a baby under your charge. Just so we’re clear.   
  
**Fleabag:** You Irishmen just can’t resist perpetuating stereotypes of drunkenness.   
  
**Fleabag:** And you drink alone every night.   
  
**Priest:** But not in spirit.   
  
**Fleabag:** I’m watching Bake Off in a few if you’d like to do that in spirit instead.   
  
**Priest:** We could When Harry Met Sally it.

\--

I read his text a few times over and phone him up before I can think better of it.

“Now, I should warn you that I still haven’t watched last week’s episode,” he tells me at once. “So I don’t want any spoilers.”

I frown, looking down at the Baby as though she will somehow be able to offer some insight into this absurd request. “You do realize that the absence of one additional contestant is going to make last week’s elimination _pretty_ obvious.”

“Right, but I meant the other spoilers. What will Paul say that reads as borderline harassment, how extravagant will Noel’s shirt be, which bakes will they work too hard to debate the quality of in order to make the elimination or Star Baker less obvious…”

“Oh, sure, those spoilers,” I agree, grinning. In my arms, the Baby squirms a bit in her sleep, as though she somehow knows that I’m more endeared than I should be. “So I can warn you about who’s left?”

He hums. “Might be for the best.”

Quietly – because Claire has also fallen behind and I don’t want her to hear – I whisper, “Sura.”

“Shit, you’ve _got_ to be kidding. After that fucking amazing-looking soda bread?”

“I know, I know. I remember you were fond of her.”

“Now the episode hasn’t even begun and I’m distraught.”

“You would have been distraught anyway once you saw she was missing!”

This point goes unheard as the Priest continues, “Am I perpetuating stereotypes of Irish drunkenness if I’m getting drunk to mourn the loss of my favorite baker on a light-hearted amateur baking competition?”

Perhaps it’s that I’m holding the Baby; perhaps it’s that I’m not drinking tonight when I really, really want to; or perhaps it’s just this particular moment on this particular Tuesday night, this question makes me laugh and it just _gets_ to me.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Go on.”

I hesitate for an eternity. The _Bake Off_ opening has begun, and I can even hear it, light and tinny, on the Priest’s end of the line. “If COVID disappeared tomorrow, would we just… stop?”

“Oh. I… I honestly hadn’t really let myself think that far ahead.”

“I hadn’t either, but I feel like my repression tactics are wearing a little thin.”

He lets out a soft, uncomfortable laugh—uncomfortable that he still wants to laugh, I think, not uncomfortable with me. “Nothing’s changed, if that’s… what you’re asking.”

Kindly, I tell him, “I never expected it to. Not for a second.”

“I mean, things have changed,” he qualifies. “Being a priest is the most exhausting it’s ever been and so many people have so many doubts right now that it sort of rubs off, which is fucking _awful_ when I need to be the voice of reassurance. So I’m not going to lie and say that leaving hasn’t crossed my mind. For myself, not for you, even though it has absolutely occurred to me that I’d then be able to beg you to forgive me for stomping on your heart at a bus stop twice and take me back like the undeserving but devoted man that I am.”

_(Fuck, that was frankly more honesty than I think I’d prepared myself for.)_

“But we can’t… this won’t work once a text or phone call can turn into dropping in on one another, will it?”

“ _God_ , no. Which I mean in the most complimentary way,” the Priest rushes to add.

I laugh weakly. “It’s odd, because it’s not going to disappear all at once. It’s going to happen in phases. Do we say goodbye once the first vaccines are administered? Once I’ve reopened the café? Once _we’ve_ been vaccinated, either one of us?”

“I know.”

“I don’t think I can do that. I can’t do ambiguous. Not with… not with this.”

He leaves that hanging for a few moments. “I get that. What should we do about it, then?”

“I’ll think about it.”

\--

Decide on our own goodbye. And I know it the moment he asks, but I don’t tell him until a day later. Over text, because I can’t bring myself to hear his voice crack when he replies.

_November_

With the new month comes another tightening of restrictions, as well as Claire’s return to Finland with the Baby.

I’d known I would miss her – though I’m also thrilled that my fridge will no longer be bursting with milk and formula – but I feel her absence even more than I’d anticipated. With her gone, the new lockdown feels worse than any part of the pandemic so far.

I return to more regular video chats with Dad, and I even don’t mind much that Stepmother jumps in at the worst possible moment each time.

I continue to text the Priest. We pretend, mostly, that we’re not watching the doomsday clock tick down to the new year, when we agreed to walk away.

_(Does it keep me up some nights, knowing that I’ll fall asleep and wake up with one less day with him? Perhaps.)_

But things are easier now, too, since we’ve talked about our not-friendship. It feels safer to joke about it. It feels safer to get tipsy and vulnerable with him, and for him to get tipsy and vulnerable with me.

_(“I think you might be a masochist,” Claire told me before she left. She also said that she didn’t want to discuss him again, once she was back home with Klare. She said there was no point, which—fair.)_

I don’t remember anymore whether I’d really gotten over him before all this, and I’ve no clue how I’m supposed to get over him once it’s finished.

\--

**Today** 9:32 PM   
**Fleabag:** Am I allowed to give you a Christmas present?   
  
**Priest:** A Christmas present??   
  
**Priest:** What type of present are we talking?   
  
**Priest:** If it’s atheist propaganda, my allegiance already lies elsewhere.   
  
**Fleabag:** Oh fuck off.   
  
**Fleabag:** Something to remind you of everything you’re missing long after you’ve fallen out of love with me.   
  
**Fleabag:** I can’t be more specific, obviously. Ruins the surprise.   
  
**Priest:** I might have had my eye on a gift for you as well.   
  
**Fleabag:** Yeah??   
  
**Fleabag:** Any hints?   
  
**Priest:** You cannot be serious.   
  
**Fleabag:** Fine.   
  
**Fleabag:** I was planning on liberating one of my stepmother’s pieces.   
  
**Priest:** I’m honored.   
  
**Priest:** How are you going to manage that? Steal into their house at night?   
  
**Fleabag:** We’ve just decided I’ll visit for Boxing Day.   
  
**Priest:** Oh no.   
  
**Fleabag:** Oh no?   
  
**Today** 10:11 PM   
**Fleabag:** Oh no????   
  


_December_

I don’t know which is worse—the number of petty references Stepmother has made to my failed engagement, or the fact that the Priest has allowed his hair to grow out during the pandemic and I _cannot_ stop thinking about touching it.

We’re not even going to address the fact that we’ve wound up in this wretched position in the first place. We weren't even planning to see each other again, before the end. To be brought together like this...

“Have you got the café up and running again?”

“For the most part,” I tell Stepmother, trying to smile. “My old server had to move back to Wales to take care of his dad during all this, so I’m doing limited hours while I search for his replacement. But I’ve found some people who’ve shown interest, so it shouldn’t take too long.”

“Oh, I’m so glad.”

_(How can a smile be_ that _passive-aggressive?)_

Without meaning to, I catch the Priest’s eye, and he just barely suppresses a smile. But – perhaps foolishly – neither of us had been anticipating the Stepmother to turn her gentle condescension on him next. “And tell us, Father, how affected are your daily operations at this point?”

He startles, looking over toward her with slightly wild eyes. “We’re, uh, mostly back to normal. By the end of Lent, our Sunday numbers were back to what they were this time last year, and we’ve not had any outbreaks. And I’m on my normal routine of paying visits to the elderly and the like.”

“What a relief,” Stepmother says. “We’ll have to start coming again. _Someone_ was a bit anxious to go back to church too soon.” She pats Dad’s hand good-naturedly.

“I completely understand.” The Priest smiles between them both. “And the Church does, too, both big ‘C’ and little ‘c.’ You’ll be welcome back whenever you’re ready.”

_(Considering that Stepmother has_ always _been a Christmas-and-Easter Catholic, I imagine that won’t be often.)_

Silence falls at the table as we all take bites almost in unison. Chewing. Chewing.

God, this is miserable. I’ve got very little to say to Dad and Stepmother, and nothing to say to the Priest that I’d much like to say in front of them. But here he is, in front of me for the first time since that God-awful night…

“I’m going to run to the loo,” I say abruptly, rising to my feet and grabbing my bag.

“Oh, the sink is broken down here, so why don’t you go on up and use the one in the guest room?”

“Please don’t go into my studio,” Stepmother calls after me.

I do, of course, not bothering with the loo at all.

They’d mentioned that she’d been doing a lot of sculptures the past few months, but that was an understatement—the room is filled with them, small and large, ceramic and metal, abstract and realistic. Several of them are… quite pretty.

_(How dare she be so productive during a global crisis.)_

I’m tracing my fingers over a small ceramic horse, which trails off into a vague wisp somewhere between the front and back legs, when I realize I’m not alone. I spin around, ready to make an apathetic apology to Stepmother or to laugh it off with my dad. But it’s the Priest. Of course it is.

He’s leaning against the doorjamb, watching me. I swallow and gesture toward the horse. “Do you like this one?”

“What do you think of it?”

“I like it, I think.”

The Priest smiles, just from the corner of his mouth. “Me too, I think.”

“You might want to run off. Plausible deniability in case something were to happen to it.”

“Oh, as if your stepmother would ever accuse me of having anything to do with the liberation of one of her pieces.”

I smile softly. “I like that you’ve called it a liberation. But fuck off, or you’ll ruin the surprise.”

He retreats, smirking, and for just a moment, things feel as easy as they did the night we first met.


End file.
